Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Republican Contest: Battle Of The Scumbags

Where do they dig up these cretins? I mean, is it really possible that in the 21st century these guys can be the front runners of one of America's two mainstream parties to be the next president? Seriously?
On the bright side, I can't see how the Republicans can possibly win the White House with these evil, fanatical weasels running up against Obama.

Don't get me wrong, Obama is no shirk when it comes to evil himself. He ramped up the illegal war inside the borders of Pakistan (not to mention in Afghanistan et al), he continued the clampdown on civil liberties in the United States. He not only did nothing to help out the millions of Americans who were losing their homes and their jobs, he hired the jokers who were responsible for the 2008 economic meltdown as his advisors. And he handed out money to the richest of the rich to reward them for screwing up the global economy. But Obama doesn't come across as a crass, personally odious and heartless asshole. The Republican presidential hopefuls?

Well, first there's Rick Santorum who would urge his daughter, were she raped and impregnated, to not get an abortion. Why? Well gals you really ought to accept the "gift" that "God is giving to you." What's more odious than this is that millions of freaky deaky US conservatives will vote for him precisely because he is such a vile shitburger (to use the proper term of this type of human being). Happily, so many people know what kind of dude he is that if you google his name you are just as likely to come up with results that compare him to fecal matter (thank you, Dan Savage!) as to his actual personage.

Then there's the front runners, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney. These two jokers are trying to out do each other in the "you're more of a corrupt and selfish fuck" contest. It really is hard to pick which one is the winner. Could it be Romney whose job as the head of a Bain Capital was to throw American workers onto the unemployment line. As reward for that despicable role Romney made millions, for which he paid little - if any taxes. His reluctantly released returns of the past two years showed him paying less than 15% taxes on $45 million in income - and those are for years when he knew he was going to run for president. He has refused to release the details of earlier returns when, it is speculated he probably paid even less, not thinking about his presidential career.

Gingrich is, of course, a long time crook who was so corrupt that even the Republicans turfed the dirt bag as head of their party back in '95 because of his, possibly illegal, activities while lecturing poor Americans - and implementing cutbacks. As Romney himself said during debates last night:

"The speaker was given an opportunity to be the leader of our party in 1994 and at the end of four years he had to resign in disgrace," said Romney. "In the 15 years after he left the speakership, the speaker has been working as an influence peddler in Washington."

As Romney pointed out, Gingrich was not only paid millions by pharmaceutical companies while serving as a US Representative in Congress who opposed healthcare reforms - a position that benefited the people paying him big bucks. He also was paid $1.6 million by Fannie Mae - the semi-public US mortgage lender that had to be bailed out because of its role in the sub-prime debacle. Gingrich tried to claim that he was hired as a "historian" but nobody can possibly buy that he was paid $1.6 million - $25,000 per month for six years - to give lessons on the origins of the American suburb. It's so not surprising that Gingrich is receiving big time backing from the wife of Sheldon Adelson who is a major casino owner. I mean, does it get any more parasitic than owning a casino?

Certainly all these creeps deserve to be put in jail rather than in the highest political office in America. But the fact that their personal failings dominates the debate as it does, is not only a sign of how corrupt the presidential candidates (all of them multi-millionaires) all are. It is also a sign of the corruption of American politics. There is so little real difference between the candidates from both parties that you'd be hard pressed to slide a cigarette paper between them. Even where their rhetoric differs by degrees the policies that they implement are well nigh identical and the differences in their impact on the lives of ordinary Americans fades to statistical insignificance.

If I were an American citizen I can tell you where my vote would go: Revolution, Egypt style. It's long overdue, don't you think?